Sound Running's The TEN on the Horizon (3/16)

Stand corrected: Kelati is entered. Fantastic! Sub-30 for her as well?

Also note Sara Hall & Keira D'Amato attempting a quick turnaround following their Oly Marathon Trials races.

And, I now spy four sub-28 guys in the non-Paris race.

Cranny is not listed. Does this mean she isn't running the 10k this year? Even a Sub 31 top 5 finish at the 10 would push her into the world rankings quota, same with Kelati. Is she just going to focus on the 5k then at nationals or does she try and double in the 1500 which might be controversial on team Boss to come in and bump McGee and Jones further down the already crowded 1500m pecking order.

Bump from a few weeks back.

Suddenly, this "meaningless race in California" (attribution: 4-letter word that starts with an R) has now become one of the most meaningful races on the t&f calendar following conclusion of NCAAs.

So much so, a certain elite college coach has been cajoled off camera to enter his now-multiple national champion in this race.

To be clear, no race is meaningless; one an always find value in racing, even a mid-week dual meet.

Thus, to call Sound Running's The TEN "meaningless" is essentially a personal attack on Jesse Williams/CEO who has assembled the best international 10k field in the world this year outside of the Olympic final. This is a WA Continental Tour silver label meet which will have more depth -- and possibly a faster winning time -- than the FBK Games/Hengelo gold label meet coming up in July which will likely feature the Ethiopian Oly trials.

Whether Nico races or not, we already have Habtom Samuel/NM/Eritrea entered following his 5k-4th/3k-7th NCAA double.

Also note that Bob Liking/WI -- who did not race NCAAs -- is entered in the TrackTown 10k which currently includes eight entrants with sub-28:00 prs.

There has even been a third men's race added for guys having prs in the 28s.

With the recent addition of Dillon Maggard, the Paris 10k race now includes every top US 10k runner save Connor Mantz/Oly marathon and Ahmed Muhumed/World XC -- and possibly Nico.

Luis Grijalva name now shows on the Paris race list, thus joining teammates Abdi & Woody.

Japan is flying in a dozen of its best, with seven entered in the men's Paris race.

All fields have now been populated, including the HS races.

For those with qualms re: Flotrack $30/month subscription, suggest the following:

Sign up for one month on 3/14. You will then be able to watch The TEN, Stanford Invite on 3/29-30 and Bryan Clay on 4/11-13. Essentially, three PPVs @ $10 each.

From Alicia Monsons Strava, it sound she has been doing workouts with Tsigie leading up to the Ten. So I'd imagine they'll both work together to get close to 29:30 once the pacers step off. Also does anyone know if the pace lights will be there this year?

So, will there be two pacers for this? Last year there was a breakaway chase pack of Henes, Rogers and O'keefe going for the standard instead of the AR. I imagine more will be in that group as this is an Olympic year, but I can't recall if the second group had a pacer.

The 1500m looks weak, but excited for the 10k. In the 1500m, really just curious to see how Gregory is recovering from her surgery last year.

I am pulling for Henes to PR and get the standard but she seems to still be recovering.

Watch out for the Swedish runner Andreas Almgren! With an optimal race, he is easily capable for 26:50-27:00.

That's the last few pieces of info yet to be revealed:

Who are the pacers?

What are their targeted paces?

Will there be pacing lights?

Have to believe the answer to the Q is yes since WavelIght tech has been used before.

Also, was presuming Cranny would open her season as Alicia's pacer as she's the only US-based pro who could take them thru 14:50/5k then maybe a bit further.

However, no one from Team BOSS is entered and no mention has been made by any of them on social media re: The TEN, so presume that was a false hope.

However, Courtney Frerichs has mentioned an interest in doing so presuming her winter training went well -- and it has gone very well -- so maybe we'll see her on the starting line.

In any case, with The TEN being the only t&f game in town this upcoming weekend (note: smart move by SR to move this meet from the 1st to the 3rd weekend in March after indoor track worldwide has concluded, thus having this full week all to themselves), we'll be finding out these remaining details within a few days.

No reason for her to. Cranny is a shoe-in for the 5K at Trials and is one of our best hopes in that that distance. Hope St Pierre runs it and gets in too. Then either Schweitzer, Rogers of Valby

Man, it’s tough to see flotrack continuing to acquire streaming rights to these events. I understand that it must be a good business decision, but I’m shocked anymore is willing to pay $30/month. Hopefully it means more dollars for the athletes, which I’m fully onboard for. I guess I’ll just follow along on the message board

I posted this in a separate thread but - did anyone else notice that Everlyn Kemboi NCAA 10k champ, 5k Runnerup is running but that she is listed as USA? Her WA profile says USA now too.

After she won last spring she said she was going back to Kenya to train for their Oly team so I wonder what happened. In any case, this is really interesting development for the US women's 10k team, and possibly 5k, as she is a major talent. Does anyone know who she is training with?

You bring up a good point. I wonder if Flotrack’s subscription somehow goes to the athletes? I highly doubt it, though. It is more likely revenue for themselves.

It’s “shoo-in” not “shoe-in”. One makes some kind of sense and the other does not.

This is just pure speculation in a perfect situation, but I assume the breakdown of money is that Sound Running pays appearance fees to get good athletes / pacers / pay their event team. They also get entry fees from the HS athletes / low profile pros and semi pros.

Then Flotrack pays them a lump sum up front for the rights to stream the event. This reimburses SR for their event costs.

Then FloTrack collects all of the stream money to refund their purchase and make money on top of it to pay their stream team / equipment.

Now knowing that this is track running and makes like $10 on a good weekend, SR is probably running the event at a loss or barely break even hoping to continue building their brand / goodwill with athletes, FloTrack is barely breaking even or hoping that they get first dibs if Sound Running becomes a massive company, and Sound Running is probably not paying the athletes much at all since their is barely any money leftover.

I've wondered about Kemboi too. She was fantastic in Austin last year and might've beaten Valby had she only run the 5. I thought her returning to Kenya had more to do with family/visa issues than a realistic chance of representing Kenya in Paris. A bit weird that her WA profile doesn't list a birthdate. Maybe JG or someone will get the latest from her in the mixzone.

Why in the world do you think that Monson is capable of running 29:30? She won't get anywhere close to that.

The reason that you're shocked is because you clearly don't understand Flotrack's business model. Flotrack doesn't care about people like you. Flotrack is for parents of college and high school students.

Parents get a yearly subscription which works out to only $15 per month. That is MUCH cheaper than going to all their kids meets. Add up gas and wear and tear on their car for local meets, and plane tickets, hotels, and rental cars for far away meets, and parents could spend well over a thousand dollars per year going to all their kids meets. So for parents, Flotrack is a good deal financially. And parents are Flotrack's target marketing, not random track fans.

“Easily capable”…I am as much of a fan as most, but let’s not get ahead of ourselves.

High School parent to their child, "Good luck at the meet today. You won't see or hear me cheering for you, because I'll be at home eating some good food and seeing if I can catch a glimpse of you on the stream. We think saving a few bucks is more important than being supportive parents. Hope you understand."

Honestly, how many meets does a high school kid go to that a parent would have trouble getting to? And how many of those meets will actually be on FloTrack? Maybe, if its a really, big important meet. But if it is that important, isn't that even more reason to make the extra effort to be there?

YOU might think that. But most parents think differently.

Did you see the stands at the Armory this weekend for the Nike Indoor National meet? There were thousands of kids that competed there, and there were only a few hundred people in the stands. Subtract all of the coaches, and that means that there were very few parents there.

As far as college meets go, many college meets are far away from the college. The parents that live near the college can at least get to a few local college meets. The rest of the meets they watch on Flotrack.

And I know lots of college runners who have zero meets within 1,000 miles of where their parents live. You think their parents are going to fly to every meet? Nope. That's where Flotrack comes in.

Once again, you aren't a parent of a runner so you aren't Flotrack's target market.